St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1887-05-17
Noble Contributions to the World Of III,
by Painters of the North
land.
Some Of the Great Scandinavian Names
Made Famous in European
Galleries.
Founding Of the First Academy at StoCa-
helm---Art Growth Above the
Baltic.
The Famed Landscapes and Marine
Views Produced by Seandina-
vian Artists.

but the dialogue certainly sounded like
this:
Scandinavian art. What do they
mean by scandinavian arts' 1 defy you
TO name three Scandinavian artists
known outside Of their own country"
NONSENSE! Why to begin with,
there's ThofwaIaseh, and, then, let me
see, Thorwaldsell, and" the second
voice went Off in certain embarrass-
ment, as of fast eyaporating conf
dence.
The zeal of the would-be informant
need not have dropped so suddenly.
Scandinavian art has had. it is true, but
a recent development. The standard
works on the history of art almost
wholly ignore the countries north Of the
T Baltic; 50 that up to the end OF the eigh-
teenth century yeu shall find scarcely
q Scandinavian name to add to That of
ThorWaldsen. And Thorwaldsen's own
! ripper fame belongs to the nineteenth
| century. Not that the fine arts lacked
encouragement in q country which pro-
duced "a Gustavus Adolphus. The
academy of Stockholm was founded
| as early as 1913, while in Denmark,
| over a hundred years before, architect
IRE had been pursued with great en-
thusiasm under Christian ~. 1t
may be that Scandinavia should
| have the credit of much that has been
| attributed to Germany in art pr0duc-
| ton. 1t has been the fashion, one might
say the passion, with Scandinavian ar
| fists to study in Germany, and after
wards to settle there. Their birth place
| is apt to be forgotten, and their work
| identified with their mere dwelling
place. The foremost landscape painter
of Norway is known. as Guide, OF CariS-
ruhe:" while Dusseldorf, Munich and
even Vienna get the reputation which
rightfully belongs to ChriStiana, or
| Stockholm or Copenhagen. But in the
| present century the tendency OF the
| Scandinavian artists towards an fdenti-
+ cal field of art and distinction has served
| to group them as an independent
| sehad. The last seyenty-fiye years
! has seen an extraordinary growth,
! a. growth SO sudden as to seem not q
growth at all, and yet SO mature as to
seem the prodHet of ages. I refer. of
I course, to the great school of marine
| painters. 1.-The races Oh the shores of
the North sea have produced the best
marine art the world has ever SeeH." So
says Mr.. BENJAMIN. Guide, of Carlsruhe,
! whose name heads a long procession OF
medals and erderS atteSting the hsnor
of his work Throughout the continent,
and who received a medal at Pififa-
| delphia in 1875. Guide is a Norwegian.
I So is Otto Sinding, a coast painter ''whO
makes one actually hear the roar of the
breakers, as they chase each other
in tumultueus masses and lash
| the rocks with a power that
/ may be felt" Sorensen, also credited
with a medal at Philadelphia, was
Dane. So is Rasmussen, author of the
magnificent discovery of Greenland by
Erie" So was Skovgaard, who ''Of all
Northern artists most nearly approached
| Claude Lorraine" Edward and j. e.
Bergh, whose ''grand landscapes" says
Mr.. Atkinson, ''might have been painted
at Dusseldorf" were Swedes. So was
Kjorbece, whose Humiliation brought
800 guineaS at the london sale of 1874.
So was HOckert, who springs the North
to us i'll his portfolio" His Sermon
| took the Paris medal of 1853. 1T
| charmed us like magic ev0cation of an
unknown country declares Edmund
About.
These it will be noticed, are, in the
main, landscape painters. There have
not been wanting representatives of the
ether schools. Hockert himself was
even more noted as an historical painter.
Gronland, who won two medals at Paris
and was esteemed one of the best fruit
| painters in Europe, was Dane. SO
| was Meyer, whose Family of LaZZa-
roni' hangs in the National gallery at
| Berlin. SalmsOn, whose ''Fete of st.
| John" belongs TO the COrcOran c0llec-
| ton at Washington, is Swede. The
picture was selected for purchase by the
ministry of Beaus Arts at Paris, but
their funds proved insufficient, and
Adolph Fiedemand, the Millais of
the North, was the court painter
of Norway-'A Painter of Man
ners," says L'Art, ''of talent severe
| and elevated" 1.-The primevaf strength
/ of the Norwegian peasant would never
| have been so well-known if this artist
had not represented it by aeademical
idealization. His feeling. conception
and mastery NATURALIZATION tranSfig-
ure most of his persOnageS, even when
they are not correct. according to the
accepted idea of beauty" is the tribute
of a German critic.
Nor has sculpture lacked a successor
to Thorwaldsen. The Ascension"
which took the grand prize given by the
| Princess Albert. of Prussia. was by
.Jerchau. Dane. 1t is the same artist
whose monuments TO OerSted and An
/ dersen, at Copenhagen, honor himself
equally with those for whose fame he
| labOred.
But these are scattered names. 1t is
| III landscape liidu ocdilulidNId HdS
founded a distinct and Individual
sehOol-a school of consummatc artists,
who have given lis some of the nobleSt
painting of the nineteenth century. 1t
is true that until very recently it has
been the fashion to diSparage landscape
painting. Painters of the historical and
genre schools are especially apt to treat
it scornfully. 1T is so easy" say they.
''Any portrait painter can paint land
seapes. But landscape painters as a
rule know nothing of drawing. Ii they
did, why do they ad0rn their pictures
with puppets and dolls dressed up as
peasants?'" AS if one should say
landscape painter is of no account, for
| he isn't a portrait painter. Another rea-
I SON suggested for this sighting regard
is that Landscape painting is only the
representation of matter, while figure
painting is the representation of mind
"a doctrine of irreverent contempt for
nature, and God i'll nature, which Ham,
erton rebukes with proper indignation.
On the other hand, as Mr.. Hamerton
suggests, landscape has feature of pos
| tive advantageous which affects the
spectator of art equally with the artist
1t is that nature is never grossly repel-
lent. Men and women have fatal
liberty which mountains have not. They
have the liberty of spelling themselves,
of making themselves ugly and mean
and ridiculous. They tattoo themselves
in South sea islands; what they do in
North sea islands il would be more pru-
dent not to particulariZe. But noun
tain does not know how to be ridiculous.
A mountain cannot dress in bad taste.
Neither is it capable of degrading itself
by vice. Noble human life in great
and earnest age is better artistic mate
rial than wild nature: but human life
in, an age like ours is not"
As to the case of landscape painting,
it has to meet two problems Of extra
ordinary difficulty. One is that very